Just before I go to sleep at night I triple-check my alarm clock is set for 6:20 AM. Well, that’s what I used to do.

This morning I realized my alarm clock hasn’t been used in weeks because Junior wakes at 6:00 AM every morning, 7 days a week. How do I know he’s awake? The baby monitor picks up his gurgling and he often heralds the day with bouts of gas.

Sweet alarm clock how I’ll miss you!

Everyone knows that RSS rocks. Why visit your favorite web sites when you can ingest their content into a single application, a la, an RSS newsreader. For me it’s NetNewsWire but I want the option to read my feeds from a web app with the same convenience as reading e-mail with Gmail.

Of course this presents a problem of syncing my feeds with the web-based application. The latest beta of NNW will sync with Newsgator but the latter is subscription ($) based. Two other web-based readers, Bloglines and Google Reader, are free but they can only import/export, not automatically sync.

It’s a mild hassle importing every so often (I’m lazy) but I suspect it’s only a matter of time until Google opens an API to their Reader app, like Google Maps, and every RSS reader in the world will have the means to sync with Google Reader.

Until then, this is yet another example of system incompatibility a mere 26 years into the evolution of computers. Just when you think the industry “gets it” they trip over their feet again.

Every other day I see a news story about the Bush Administration wanting to reverse previous “pro-environment” legislation. Most notable is the Arctic Refuge.

Now it appears they want to change the long-standing Endangered Species Act.

A diving buddy sent me an email he received from a close friend now serving in Iraq. I excerpted a portion of the letter where the young solider makes a notable observation about Iraq’s long history of violence and hope for the future.

[The] Iraqis are people, just like us but with different cultural standards and customs.  They do not enjoy killing each other but they are locked by emotional forces and misunderstanding of what true peace is all about, history has taught them this lifestyle and they have been beaten into accepting this as a way of life.  On many levels we are building new ideas and teaching them how to value life in a new way - that is how you influence the fight in Iraq and that is how you share a democracy - build relationships.  This is the fight of the future and it has been very rewarding.

The full letter appears after the jump.

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We’ve discovered that Junior makes an excellent excuse for just about anything.

• A buddy wants to watch a lame football game at the local dive bar.  “Sorry, gotta watch Junior while the wife goes out.”

• Tired of that 1-year old’s birthday party where his parents are more interested than he is? “Oh, Junior has been up since 5:00 AM and needs to get home for a nap.”

The excuses go on…

• Junior is sick and just gave us his cold
• I have to pick him up from day care
• We can’t come over because it’ll be past his bed-time

Mind you these are often valid reasons to bail but the other party will never know the truth from exaggeration.

A few days ago I discovered I could use Junior to insult a clerk at Walgreens. I didn’t intend to but I needed to drop off a prescription, felt under the weather, had a crying baby, and every clerk was 100% busy with their one customer.

When the main clerk called her Manager to assist with the scanning of 4 identical items, I looked down at Junior and said “I guess everyone is too busy today to handle the work.”

She gave me a look but, come on, who can possibly be angry at someone with a crying baby? At her suggestion I went to another clerk in cosmetics to handle my purchase.

In case you’re wondering, I didn’t have an ounce of guilt.